“A couple of weeks ago I posted a blog about the challenges Apple might face in what appeared to be a threatened legal battle with Palm and its new Pre touch screen smart phone. Or any other comers that Apple deemed as ‘ripping off’ its intellectual property, as Chief Operating Officer Tim Cook put it on the company’s earnings call recently,” Jim Goldman reports for CNBC.
“This morning, wireless analyst Pablo Perez-Fernandez of Global Crown Capital is out with the most detailed note yet as to just how difficult — and financially dangerous — Apple’s battle could be, if it decides to go after Palm,” Goldman reports.
“His report this morning says that if Apple goes after Palm, it could also wage patent war against HTC, Garmin and Research in Motion since all of them use some form of the ‘multi-touch’ interface, specifically the ‘pinching’ motion to control images on the screen,” Goldman reports. “However, Perez-Fernandez points out that the US Patent Office may have erred in its awarding of the Apple patent, that the firm’s research indicates that Apple’s own patents, indeed its technology, may be in violation of a patent already awarded to the University of Delaware, and that if Apple proceeds with threatened litigation, it may end up with no protections of any kind when it comes to the multi-touch interface for both iPod and iPhone.”
Goldman reports that Perez-Fernandez says, “‘They are also trying to pre-empt Microsoft’s use of multi-touch in Windows 7 and they are trying to trademark multi-touch, which is ridiculous since the term has been used openly for a long time.'”
MacDailyNews Take: Apple’s not “trying” to do anything: Multi-Touch™ is a trademark of Apple Inc. – May 29, 2008
Goldman reports, “Perez-Fernandez argues that Apple has no legal ground to stand on, and while the sabre-rattling might be rattling some competitor stocks, if Apple were to move forward with any litigation based on this, it could prove more threatening to itself than to any of its rivals.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Since when are Global Crown Capital analysts expert patent attorneys? Ask Dr. Fernández a math question instead; according to his bio, he holds “a bachelor’s degree in pure Mathematics from Yale University and a Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics from the University of California in Los Angeles.” Try this one: ($28.145 billion in cash on hand – $0 debt) – ($224 million in cash on hand – $396 million in debt) = ?
Now, go to the next random brokerage house, Jim, and find some other “analyst” who’ll tell you Apple has a slam dunk case and write that one up, too, okay? We’d rather wait to see what actually happens and report on that instead.
Oh, by the way: “FingerWorks was a gesture recognition company based in the United States, known mainly for its TouchStream multitouch keyboard. Founded by John Elias and Wayne Westerman of the University of Delaware in 1998, it produced a line of multi-touch products including the iGesture Pad and the TouchStream keyboard. Its assets were acquired by Apple Inc. in early 2005, and its product lines were discontinued.” – Wikipedia
Finally, how about some disclosure? It would be nice, not to mention helpful, to know if Pablo Perez-Fernandez’s and Global Crown Capital’s holdings involve any of the companies being discussed.
